Scarpinato case: FdI calls on the M5S to replace him on the Anti-Mafia Committee. The Five Star Movement: ‘No attempt to mislead the investigation’
The case stems from the decree by which Santi Bologna, the investigating magistrate in Caltanissetta, dismissed – at the request of the Public Prosecutor’s Office – the line of inquiry against persons unknown concerning the 1992 massacres linked to the ‘Mafia-contracts’ dossier
Fratelli d’Italia has called on the Five Star Movement to replace Senator Roberto Scarpinato on the parliamentary Anti-Mafia Committee. The request is set out in a letter signed by the FdI group leaders in the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, Lucio Malan and Galeazzo Bignami. It is addressed to the Five Star Movement’s group leaders, Luca Pirondini and Riccardo Ricciardi, and copied to the committee chair, Chiara Colosimo, and all members.
The massacres of 1992
The case stems from the decree by which Santi Bologna, the investigating magistrate in Caltanissetta, dismissed – at the request of the Public Prosecutor’s Office – the line of inquiry against persons unknown concerning the 1992 massacres linked to the ‘Mafia-contracts’ dossier. In the same decree, the judge dismissed the proceedings for aggravated aiding and abetting against former public prosecutors Gioacchino Natoli and Giuseppe Pignatone on the grounds that the statute of limitations had expired.
With regard to Scarpinato, a former magistrate and now an M5S senator, the investigating judge focuses on a telephone call with Natoli, his former colleague, which took place prior to the latter’s hearing at Palazzo San Macuto. ‘What must be highlighted here is the attempt by Senator Scarpinato to mislead Dr Natoli,’ writes Bologna.
FdI: pollution that works in its favour
Malan and Bignami refer to that passage and also quote from the decree a reference to ‘polluting activity’ carried out ‘for one’s own benefit’. According to the two FdI representatives, it is ‘utterly clear that it is impossible to work with peace of mind, let alone safeguard the commission’s full institutional credibility’, if its members include someone whom ‘a judge of the Republic has identified as having engaged in a cover-up precisely regarding the facts the commission is investigating’.
Hence the request to ‘replace the senator with another member of your group’. “You have always expressed respect for the words of the magistrates involved in the fight against the Mafia. This is your chance to prove it through your actions,” they conclude. Already yesterday, the committee’s vice-chair, Mauro D’Attis (Fi), had described the senator’s behaviour as “disturbing”.
